John Leland on Separation of Church and State

All quotation taken from Charles Hyneman and Donald Lutz,
Political Writing During the Founding Era: 1760-1805,
in two volumes.

John Leland (1754 - 1841) was a Baptist Minister that lived and
worked in the state of Massachusetts. Leland was committed to
separation, and helped Madison win the Virginia battles for
religious freedom. In addition, he helped lead the fight to ratify
the Constitution in Massachusetts. His writings under the name
Jack Nips in THE YANKEE SPY was an effort to gain support
for separation of church and state in Massachusetts.

Let it suffice on this head to say, that it is not possible in
the nature of things to establish religion by human laws without
perverting the design of civil law and oppressing the people (from
The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name
of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).

Is it the duty of a deist to support that which he believes to be
a cheat and imposition? Is it the duty of the Jew to support the
religion of Jesus Christ, when he really believes that he was an
imposter? Must the papist be forced to pay men for preaching
down the supremacy of the pope, whom they are sure is the head of
the church? Government has no more to do with the religious
opinions of men than it has with the principles of mathematics
(from The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen
name of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).

To say that religion cannot stand without a state establishment
is not only contrary to fact (as has been proved already) but is
a contradiction in phrase. Religion must have stood a time
before any law could have been made about it; and if it did stand
almost three hundred years without law it can still stand without
it (from The Connecticut Dissenters Strong Box, Number One,
New London 1802).

If government can answer for individuals at the day of judgment,
let men be controlled by it in religious matters; otherwise let
men be free (from The Connecticut Dissenters Strong Box,
Number One, New London 1802.

To read in the New Testament, that the Lord has ordained that
those that preach the gospel shall live by its institutions and
precepts, sounds very harmonical; but to read in a state
constitution, that the legislature shall require men to maintain
teachers of piety, religion and morality, sounds very discordant
(from The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name
of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).

In the second article [of the Massachusetts state constitution of
1780] it is said, 'is the right and duty of all men publicly, and at
stated seasons, to worship the Supreme Being.' This article would
read much better in a catechism than in a state constitution, and
sound more concordant in a pulpit than in a statehouse
(from The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name
of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).

...[A]nd the reason why public worship is enjoined (required) by
authority, and private worship is omitted, is only to pave the
way for some religious establishment by human law, and force
taxes from the people to support avaricious priests.
(from The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name
of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).

What leads legislators into this error, is confounding sins and
crimes together -- making no difference between moral evil and
state rebellion: not considering that a man may be infected with
moral evil, and yet be guilty of no crime, punishable by law. If
a man worships one God, three Gods, twenty Gods, or no God -- if
he pays adoration one day in a week, seven days or no day --
wherein does he injure the life, liberty or property of another?
Let any or all these actions be supposed to be religious evils
of an enormous size, yet they are not crimes to be punished by
laws of state, which extend no further, in justice, than to
punish the man who works ill to his neighbor (from The Yankee
Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name of Jack Nipps,
Boston, 1794).

In a well regulated state it will be the business of the
legislature to prevent sectaries of different denominations from
molesting and disturbing each other; to ordain that no part of
the community shall be permitted to perplex and harass the other
for any supposed heresy, but that each individual shall be
allowed to have and enjoy, profess and maintain his own system of
religion, provided it does not issue in overt acts of treason
against the state undermining the peace and order of society.
(from The Yankee Spy, John Leland writing under the pen name
of Jack Nipps, Boston, 1794).